A digital-receiver for the Murchison Widefield Array
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Hewitt_A digital-receiver.pdf
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Author(s)
Williams, Christopher Leigh
McWhirter, Stephen R.
Kincaid, Barton B.
Lonsdale, Colin John
Oberoi, Divya
Salah, Joseph E.
Morgan, Edward H
Hewitt, Jacqueline N
Kratzenberg, Eric W
Cappallo, Roger J
Date Issued
February 2015
Journal
Experimental Astronomy
Publisher
Springer-Verlag
Citation
Prabu, Thiagaraj, K. S. Srivani, D. Anish Roshi, P. A. Kamini, S. Madhavi, David Emrich, Brian Crosse, et al. “A Digital-Receiver for the MurchisonWidefield Array.” Exp Astron 39, no. 1 (February 22, 2015): 73–93.
Version
Author's final manuscript
Abstract
An FPGA-based digital-receiver has been developed for a low-frequency imaging radio interferometer, the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA). The MWA, located at the Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) in Western Australia, consists of 128 dual-polarized aperture-array elements (tiles) operating between 80 and 300 MHz, with a total processed bandwidth of 30.72 MHz for each polarization. Radio-frequency signals from the tiles are amplified and band limited using analog signal conditioning units; sampled and channelized by digital-receivers. The signals from eight tiles are processed by a single digital-receiver, thus requiring 16 digital-receivers for the MWA. The main function of the digital-receivers is to digitize the broad-band signals from each tile, channelize them to form the sky-band, and transport it through optical fibers to a centrally located correlator for further processing. The digital-receiver firmware also implements functions to measure the signal power, perform power equalization across the band, detect interference-like events, and invoke diagnostic modes. The digital-receiver is controlled by high-level programs running on a single-board-computer. This paper presents the digital-receiver design, implementation, current status, and plans for future enhancements.
MIT Department
Haystack Observatory
MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10686-015-9444-3
